If you’re looking for a family-friendly place in Rhode Island, we know just how important it is to find someplace safe. After all, finding people homes is kind of what we do at Movoto Real Estate.

But aside from that, we make lists. Lists of exciting places, expensive places, and even some that are pretty hairy. And today, we’re bringing you a list of the 10 safest places in Rhode Island—because safety’s important. And lists are fun.

If you’re a regular reader of the Movoto Real Estate blog, first of all, thanks. Second of all, some of these places probably look a little familiar, as some of them appeared on last year’s list of safest places in Rhode Island.

But as you know, a lot can change in a year. So let’s move on to see how we came up with this latest list, as well as why each of these 10 places are so safe.

Our Methodology

As with any of our Big Deal Lists, we relied, not on our own opinions, but on the cold, hard facts. So we went straight to the top guns in the field, the FBI. They recently released their 2013 FBI Uniform Crime Report, which we used to look at the largest places in Rhode Island according to the following criteria:

Murders

Rapes

Robberies

Assaults

Burglaries

Thefts

Vehicle Thefts

Then we divided these crimes into four categories:

Murders

Violent Crimes

Property Crimes

Total Crimes

Next, we calculated the number of crimes per person for each of our 38 places. We then ranked each place with a score from one to 38, where the lower scores were the safer places.

Because some crimes are more heinous than others, we decided to weight these rankings so that murders, violent crimes, and property crimes each made up 30 percent of the overall score, where the total number of crimes accounted for just 10 percent.

And finally, we averaged these weighted rankings into one overall Big Deal Score, where the lowest score went to our safest place for 2015, Little Compton.

For a look at how all of the places we looked at ranked, just pop down to the bottom of the post. Otherwise, here’s a closer look at our top 10 safest places.

1. Little Compton

Source: Flickr user dave milsom

This little town is everything that you’d expect from a charming community in the northeast—including incredibly safe.

In 2013, Little Compton had a grand total of just 26 crimes for the entire year. It had the third fewest crimes per person, but still, that’s pretty low.

And even lower was the number of violent crimes. Little Compton had none. Yes, as in zero, zilch, nada. For the entire year! This easily gave Little Compton the lowest number of violent crimes per person in the state.

2. Glocester

Source: Flickr user Andrew Malone

Just as Little Compton was on our list two years in a row, so too is Glocester (and Scituate and Richmond and Barrington…). Anyway, the reason that this town jumped from sixth to second place in just a year was its incredibly low number of total crimes in 2013.

With a population just shy of 10,000 people, and a total of 52 crimes, Glocester had the lowest number of crimes per person in the state. This was made up of 49 property crimes (also the lowest number per person) and three violent crimes (the sixth lowest number per person). None of these were murders.

Because of such a low total number of crimes, residents had just a 1 in 190 chance of being the victim of a crime.

3. Scituate

Source: Wikimedia user Swampyank

In 2013, this Providence County town had the second fewest crimes overall per person—a total of just 77 for its 10,443 residents. Interestingly, this was fewer than it had the year before (91 crimes per person), and yet Scituate dropped by one point in our rankings.

Don’t worry, Scituate residents. It wasn’t because your town got more dangerous. As a matter of fact in 2013 Scituate had just three violent crimes for the year, where in 2012 it had four, and the total number of property crimes went up only slightly.

No, the reason for its slight decline over the year really didn’t have anything to do with Scituate itself. It was merely because the cities before it improved even more than it did. So, nothing personal Scituate. You’re still safe—and in fact, even safer than you were a year ago.

4. Jamestown

Source: Flickr user Clara S.

Jamestown, you were so close to tying with Little Compton for its unbeatably low number of zero violent crimes in 2013. Unfortunately, though, there was one rape reported, giving Jamestown the second fewest violent crimes per person. Still, one violent crime for the year? Not too shabby.

5. Richmond

Source: Flickr user Susteph

Richmond went from first place on last year’s list to fifth place on this year’s, but being fifth safest in the state is nothing to shake a stick at.

Once again, it seems as though Richmond’s slight drop in rankings didn’t have a whole lot to do with Richmond itself. It had more to do with other places just getting even safer. After all, Richmond had a total of just 63 crimes in 2013, where in 2012, it had 83.

These 63 crimes were made up of 58 property crimes and five violent crimes and was the fourth lowest number of crimes per person in the state.

6. Foster

Source: Flickr user s-bahn

This newbie to our list this year ranked high for its overall low number of crimes—the fifth lowest per person, actually.

These 41 crimes were made up of 38 property crimes (also the fifth fewest per person) and three violent crimes (the 11th fewest per person).

All of this gave residents just a 1 in 114 chance of being the victim of a crime.

7. Barrington

Source: Flickr user Dan Connolly

Last year, Barrington ranked fifth on our list of safest places, and even though it comes in as seventh this year, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s any more dangerous.

It had a few more property crimes in 2013 than it did it 2012, going from 179 to 214, but it actually had fewer violent crimes—in 2012, it had two rapes, three robberies, and one assault, whereas in 2013, it just had one of each (and no murders).

In fact, it was mainly due to this fourth lowest number of violent crimes per person that Barrington came in among our top 10.

8. South Kingstown

Source: Flickr user Ginny Lacey Gorman

This town with a population of just over 30,000 residents is perfect proof that smaller doesn’t always mean safer. Case in point: Central Falls came in at the very bottom of our list and it has about 11,000 fewer residents than South Kingstown.

And speaking of South Kingstown—in 2013, this town had a total of just 318 crimes, giving it the eighth fewest crimes per person. This was made up of the seventh fewest property crimes and the 13th fewest violent crimes per person.

9. East Greenwich

Source: Flickr user Andrew Malone

In 2012, East Greenwich had a total of just 163 crimes, which included just one violent crime.

This year its total number of crimes jumped from 163 to 175, which, for its population of just over 13,000, means that it had the 12th lowest number of crimes per person. Six of these were violent crimes, which is a jump from their one robbery in 2012, but still, the seventh fewest violent crimes per person is still pretty impressive.

10. Smithfield

Source: Flickr user Jessica

Last but not least was the Town of Smithfield. This Safest Places First Timer scored well in our analysis for its impressively low number of property crimes and therefore total crimes.

In 2013, it had a reported 218 property crimes for its population of 21,490—that’s the ninth fewest property crimes per person in the state. These included 13 vehicle thefts, 155 thefts, and 50 burglaries.

This plus its 16 violent crimes gave Smithfield the ninth fewest crimes per person overall in the state.

Finding a Safe Place in Rhode Island

Finding a safe and family-friendly place in Rhode Island shouldn’t exactly be difficult—after all, it is the 14th safest state in the nation.

Unfortunately, though, not all of the Ocean State’s cities and towns are as safe as these 10. To see how your hometown ranked, just check out the table below.

Who is Movoto Real Estate, you might ask? Movoto is an online real estate brokerage based in San Mateo, CA. Our blog has been recognized for its unique approach to city-based research by major news organizations around the world such as Forbes and CBS News.